This trip wound up being a solo affair, and I’ll write in the first person for a change. The hike up Bear Creek has been on my radar for several years now, the biggest obstacle being negotiating the 2.2-mile 4wd road leading from Mono Hot Springs to the Bear Creek Diversion dam. Earlier in…
After a week-and-a-half in Redmond, WA, we were looking for something to stretch our legs and get outside. Chris’ sister, Anne, met us at Chris’ mom’s apartment in Redmond Ridge and offered to show us the walking trails in this neck of the literal woods, so the three of us headed out just after…
We had spent our second night of the drive to Seattle in Salem, OR, and the temps outside were below freezing as we left our hotel. The skies were sunny but there were many patches of low, dense fog in the area that reminded us of the tule fog back home. We had looked…
Chris’ mom, who lives in the Seattle area, was having a medical procedure in late January, so we decided to make the drive up north to help her get settled through her recovery. We made the trip in semi-leisurely fashion, spending a couple of nights at hotels along the I-5 corridor on the way….
Saturday of our weekend camping trip near Bishop found us shaking off the chilly morning in camp with coffee and a light breakfast, followed by a drive into Bishop where we stopped at Schaat’s to get some lunch for the trail. Today’s destination was Little Lakes Valley, where Chris, Jane, and Pedro had done…
Over the winter into spring, Chris had obtained four different permits to backpack in various eastern Sierra locations, and, for a semi-comedic series of obstructive events, ended up having to cancel each one of them in turn. The last of the scheduled trips was to be a loop out of Mammoth Lakes over Duck…
Just west of Inspiration Point near Wrightwood lies the high point of the part of Blue Ridge west of Highway 2, known locally as Lightning Ridge. We took Jude and Hattie on a short exploratory hike of the hilltop, walking up the PCT a few hundred yards to a use trail departing northward toward…
With Jane away by herself at the cabin, Chris accompanied the Arredondo clan for a quick trip to Wind Wolves Preserve. We headed across San Emigdio Creek and made our way up the Old Road for a few hundred yards, realizing then that we’d taken the wrong route right off the bat – we’d…
Cassie and Chris tied the knot on October 11th with as much fanfare as our semi-locked-down state would allow, and the festivities lasted well into Sunday evening. We had talked about possibly hiking on Monday before the fam all departed for home on Tuesday, and so it happened that we drove with Carter and…
Although the skies above were clear this morning, we decided to get an earlier start in case it got smoky later on. We were all up by 6:30am, so we had a few hours to relax before breaking camp, and we were packed and ready to roll by 9:00. We had a couple of…